Tutoring grandchildren.......you need to walk on eggshells

Our oldest grandson is going into second grade. My father did not speak until he was almost four. I did speech therapy first and second grade. My nephew was in speech therapy through third grade. My brother's grandchildren are having difficulty with speech and reading. This is important to my brother because the schools failed him, so now he is taking his grandson to tutoring once a week, and the kid has just blossomed.

So my wife began testing our grandson to determine what deficiencies the child had, and as an ex teacher, her skill set is very good in this regard. She was doing some word games and notices that he was phonetically spelling the same way that he speaks. So a word like rules, he would write wules. His speech, reading, and general skills are almost a grade level behind. She suspects that he needs a more precise hearing test than the schools, and a general assessment from an independent tutoring facility.

So we had the conversation with my son and his wife fearing there might be some resentment, and they too had questions about his hearing and how it impacted is school development. A great conversation where we have offered to pay for an assessment and a month of tutoring once a week, where we will take the kid to fun places and dinner after tutoring so it appears we have a go on our offer. We are excited for the grandson because he is highly intelligent, but without reading, writing, and proper speech a young person is going to have a tough time in this world.